


After-Years

by Mayamali



Series: After-Years: A Pacifist Epilogue [1]
Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Feel-good, Gen, Post-Pacifist Route, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-19
Updated: 2015-10-19
Packaged: 2018-04-27 02:12:16
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 721
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5029696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mayamali/pseuds/Mayamali
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time you woke up to the sight of the sun's rays peeking through the blinds, you cried. A dumb little second-person one-shot about someone who has to adjust to time being linear again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After-Years

**Author's Note:**

> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-K05oBku10  
> If you're interested in some mood music.

When you woke up to the sun's rays peeking through the blinds of Frisk's bedroom, you cried. Not full-on bawling; you weren't that kind of person. It was just a small, slow stream of tears as you waddled to the window and looked out on bright blue sky, clouds, and cars passing by outside.  
You never would have admitted it, but the night you reached the surface, any smiles and puns and jokes you told were to mask that pit of dread in your soul. When you woke up the next morning, you knew, you'd be right back underground, listening to your brother clanking around the kitchen below your room.

You never thought you'd be wrong, which is when the fear kicked in. Every time the timeline reset, you had some vague idea of what might happen next. But now, you had no idea what to expect; you had never experienced any of this before, and it scared you.

The first few days, you stay at home and look at the cheapest apartment listings you can find while Papyrus demands to see the human world for what it is. He comes back with a scuffed cheek; a human had punched him in the face at the grocery store.  
You grit your teeth, clench your fists, and let the ominous blue glow of your eye be a temporary nightlight before you can will yourself to sleep.

Frisk is the first one to visit your new apartment to ask if you or your brother could walk them to school; 'ambassador of the monster world' was not a popular title, it was better to be safe than sorry. Since you've started to actually be able to wake up before two in the afternoon, you volunteer; your brother was enrolled in police academy as part of his new job as a police officer, courtesy of the Monster-Human Union law, and it's been taking up most of his time.  
You hold their hand as you cross the street, and for the most part it's uneventful. It's only when you approach the front doors that you hear children snickering maliciously at Frisk's choice of bodyguard. They stop the second they blink and you're standing in front of them, smiling ominously as you ask if they want to have a bad time.

You're not allowed on school grounds after that, so you settle on walking Frisk a block away from school and carefully watching as they go the rest of the way.

With the money your brother makes, you get by, but you pick up a few odd jobs for yourself just to get out of the creaky, low-budget apartment you live in. Dishwasher at a bar, hired help at the farmer's market, cashier at a bakery... as uneasy as people are about monsters, the sight of you working pretty much everywhere in town helps to make them a little more comfortable.

Once you make enough between the both of you to get a nicer place in the suburbs, Frisk comes by for Movie and Spaghetti Night – Papyrus' idea, since he wants to make sure he keeps in touch with one of his greatest friends – the last Friday of every month. You're the last one to fall asleep; once you found a permanent job as a bouncer at the same bar you once washed dishes for, you had gotten used to late nights.  
Papyrus conks out by the middle of the second movie, snoring as he leans against your shoulder. You carefully draw a mustache on his face; Frisk's giggles are quiet so they don't wake him up. When they fall asleep, their head slowly sinking into your other shoulder like they're opposite ends of two magnets, you shrug off your hoodie and drape it over them before drifting off yourself, sandwiched in a comfortable warmth.

For the five-year anniversary of the barrier falling, you help Toriel bake a pie. While she's rolling out the crust, she confides that she's rather surprised by your demeanor; she still remembers the lazy, shuffling way you used to walk and how your clothes smelled like you hadn't washed them in months.

You remind her that, deep underground, there's still a sock sitting in an empty living room of a house with a mountain of passive-aggressive post-it notes on it. She laughs.


End file.
